2017-2018 School Year Achievement Highlights

Below are achievements by some of our staff, students, schools and departments during the 2017-2018 school year. This list is not comprehensive, and there are many more examples of student achievement. More importantly, students and teachers have supported their communities through donations of both time and money, and our students and teachers have supported each other through another year.

Student Achievement

Sissonville High School student, Brady Hanshaw, was named one of two WV Presidential Scholars by the U.S. Department of Education.

The GWHS History Bowl Placed 2nd in the nation.

WV SkillsUSA – 11 students received gold medals and qualified for nationals.

43 students qualified for the national DECA competition.

5 students were on 1st place HOSA teams and 15 students placed 1st-3rd.

4 students placed in top three of their age division at State Math Field Day.

Grandview was selected as 1 of 18 national EL (expeditionary learning) schools to participate in “A Better World Day.” Students engaged in project-based-learning around a healthier community.

The new Credits Count Grant Program was launched at Riverside, NHS, AJMS, CGMS, DMS and EBMS – with $1.5 million from AEP for increased STEM access for these students.

Pinch Elementary was named a National Apple Distinguished School.

Sissonville High School students were 1st in the state in the Vocabulary.com Vocabulary Bowl.

Mary C. Snow Elementary received $2,500 from UniCare Health Plan for winning their “Well Child Contest” among School Based Health Centers. Riverside High School received $1,000 as runner-up.

District Achievement

Transportation

KCS bus drivers and staff oversaw the transport of 8-10 million student rides to and from school without a serious injury.

Safety and security

The Safety and Security Office of Kanawha County Schools managed $252,817.18 in safety and security projects this fiscal year. Projects included:

launched a crime tip line for students, staff and community members

intercom upgrades for 17 schools

security camera system upgrades at 13 schools

1000 carbon monoxide detectors for all schools

emergency procedure flip pads for every classroom and office

implemented a redundant emergency radio network for crisis communications

purchased spill pads for all schools which greatly reduced slips trips and falls

safety incentive awards to schools with a good safety record

Child Nutrition

44 Elementary and 13 Middle Schools have obtained the Silver Award for the Healthier US School Challenge! Each school will receive 1000.00 for wellness activities, a School banner, and plaque for their efforts.

Our KCS cooks served 3,108,630 breakfasts to students and 2,233,297 lunches to students this year, representing a 3% increase from the 2016-2017 school year, all while having less students.

Counseling & Testing

Through an early college 2018 pilot program with BridgeValley CTC, Capital HS juniors were transported daily to BVCTC during the school day, where they were enrolled in two, dual-credit courses on campus working towards an associate degree in Health Sciences.

Dow Chemical Company has recruited seniors from the KCS Class of 2018 to be among the first candidates in WV to enroll in the Dow US Apprenticeship Program. Dow Apprentices will receive world-class training, on-the-job experience while earning a two-year Associate Degree in some of the most sought after jobs in the industry.

KCS High School Counselors received a $50,000 award and were recognized during the National College Access Network Conference in San Diego in September for demonstrating the 2nd highest FAFSA completion rate among 22 cities participating in the Kresge Foundation FAFSA competition. (Money Doesn’t Grow on Trees: How 22 cities Helped HS Students Complete More FAFSA’s and Get More Financial Aid Dollars. January 2018 https://kresge.org/library/report-money-doesnt-grow-trees)

KCS has adopted the Too Good for Drugs curriculum (toogoodprograms.org) for Grade K-8, including staff certification training and county-wide implementation set for Fall 2018.

April 2018 marked the first year when all KCS Juniors were given the SAT college admissions test during the school day at no cost. Students could send their scores to four colleges for free and certain scores could help meet Promise Scholarship requirements. KCS has chosen to again administer the SAT to all Juniors Spring 2019.

KCS Class of 2018 was among the first group of students in WV to begin utilizing the e-transcript- provided with the capability to request an electronic copy of their HS transcript from their personal device, to be sent to an unlimited number of colleges or universities.

Community Education

KCSCEP served more than 900 students in our Third Base/OnDeck programs this year.

Achievements of some of our 2018 Graduating Seniors

Capital

Capital High School had 2 National Merit Semi-finalists and 34 Promise Scholarship recipients from the Class of 2018. We are also very proud to have Eric Ihnat receive the Marshall University Yeager Scholarship and Michael Mullins receive the Presidential Scholarship from Bridge Valley community and Technical College.

George Washington

135 Promise recipients

9 National Merit Finalists

39 Highest Honor Graduates

50 High Honor Graduates

26 Honor Graduates

2 students going to Harvard

1 student going to a business school in Paris

A student received the Jefferson Scholarship at UVA, the Morehead-Cain scholarship at UNC and the Trustees Scholarship at University of Southern California. These scholarships are full rides to these universities.

Herbert Hoover

19 promise scholars

approximately 72% of our senior class will be attending a 2 year or 4-year college

Our senior class will have approximately $368,000 in grants and scholarships awarded to them to start their freshman year of college

Our top senior was a QuestBridge Finalist

Currently we have 62% of our seniors have completed their FAFSA

Nitro

Nitro High School had one of only nine WV students chosen for the newest class of the BS/MD program at Marshall University.

Riverside

- We had our highest number of Honors graduates in recent history with a total of 46 students graduating with a GPA of 3.8 or higher. With 13 of those students achieving a GPA of 4.5 or higher, it was the largest group of Highest Honors graduates since the school opened in 1999.

- Two of our 2018 graduates, Mathew Alexander Martin and Megan Paige Yeager, achieved some prestigious recognition in that Mathew accepted an appointment to attend the United States Military Academy at West Point and Megan will be attending an Ivy League school and enrolling in Brown University this fall.

St. Albans

FAFSA rate of 68.7%, 8% increase

Sissonville

Sissonville High School seniors received $1,931,600 worth of scholarship offerings. We had four young men commit to serve our country in the Armed Forces. We had 31 seniors complete career & technical education at our CTE schools, ready for the workforce. One of our students will represent the state of WV as a Presidential Scholar (Brady Hanshaw). This is quite a rare honor.

We had an unprecedented 13 Highest Honor Graduates--these are students with a 4.5 cumulative grade point average or above. Also seniors contributed to Sissonville High School winning state champion of the 2017-18 Vocabulary bowl.